He gave the world the pie in the face and the on-screen car chase, built Hollywood's first enclosed film stage, and launched Chaplin and Keaton. Then he lost it all, going bankrupt as much of his life's work literally disintegrated into explosive dust.

This deep dive unpacks the rise, hubris, and fall of Mack Sennett, the original architect of cinematic slapstick. It treats him as Hollywood's first tech founder: a visionary who built the infrastructure everyone used but couldn't rewrite his own operating system when the medium changed beneath him.

• How Calvin Coolidge talked a young Sennett out of his dream of becoming an opera singer
• The Keystone Fun Factory, the enclosed stage, and the under-cranking trick that made car chases look superhuman
• His rigid comedy algorithm, including the rule that Shetland ponies and ...